


A Storm in the Air

by Defira



Series: Wild Mage [5]
Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types
Genre: F/F, Pre-Dragon Age: Inquisition
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-28
Updated: 2015-02-28
Packaged: 2018-03-15 15:50:35
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 11,948
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3452996
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Defira/pseuds/Defira
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After defeating the Blight a decade ago, Elissa Cousland was appointed Teyrna of Gwaren in recognition of her service to the nation and as recompense for the loss her family suffered in the massacre at Highever. Elissa, however, did not want Gwaren; in fact, Elissa wanted nothing more than to vanish from the public eye entirely, to lick her wounds and avoid all responsibility. She certainly did not want to be foisted with the task of rebuilding a broken, abandoned province, empty and Blighted.</p><p>Instead, in defiance of the crown, she gives Gwaren to the elves- a choice that has had lasting political ramifications across the years. Now the world is falling apart, the Circles disbanded and the templars rebelling, and Orlais crumbling into civil war. When word arrives that the King and Queen have allowed the templar order to take refuge in Therinfall Redoubt- an unassailable fortress lying within the borders of the new elvhen homeland- the question becomes whether the time has come for the elves to rise up and defend their home again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. 9:41 Dragon, Gwaren

“Mistress?”

The call roused her from the depths of sleep, and Shianni groaned, rolling further onto her stomach and pulling a pillow over her head. From somewhere beyond the warmth and safety of the bed, she heard the drapes being pulled aside, and felt the change in the room as the weak morning sunlight flooded in through the glazed window panes. 

“Mistress?” She felt a pressure on the feather comforter, and then her precious bubble of warmth vanished as someone pulled the blankets aside. “My Lady Shianni?”

“What fresh horror is this,” she mumbled from underneath the pillow, trying to worm her way back under the fold in the blankets, toes stretching as she tried to find a remnant of heat. 

The hand on the comforter hesitated. “It’s... it’s morning, my Lady. You asked to be woken at the eighth mark on the sundial?”

With a groan, Shianni risked peering out from underneath the pillow, cursing roughly when the light reached her eyes. “Andraste’s tits,” she muttered, digging the heel of her palm into her eye to smear away the night’s sleep. Blinking blearily, she said “I thought I told you not to call me lady.”

“I- ah... you did, my L- I mean, um-”

“Shianni is fine,” she said, reluctantly levering herself up onto her elbows and wincing at the light streaming in through the window. Given that it was still mid winter, it was a dull and grey light, filtered through an overcast sky, but she’d still complain, damn it all. There was a dull ache in the back of her head, a not so subtle reminder that she probably drank a little too much wine with supper last night, and her eyes felt like they were full of sand. 

There was a young elf woman beside the bed, dark eyes wide and fingers twisted together anxiously as she stared; Shianni cast her a rueful smile. “We don’t stand on ceremony in these parts,” she said as an explanation, hiding a yawn behind a hand. “You haven’t been here long, have you?”

“I- ah... only two weeks,” she said, making a show of relaxing her hands to place them flat against her sides. Still too stiff though, and Shianni shook her head with a chuckle. “Da thought that, well... what with the war, we’d be better off taking a risk with our own people.”

She was a pretty little thing, not quite worn ragged by life in an alienage; she still had the nerves though, the predisposition to jump at shadows and flinch down into a smaller shape when in the presence of nobility. _Nobility_ ; Shianni still scoffed whenever someone tried to tack her on to the shem lords like an unpleasant afterthought. They had the nob bit right, if nothing else. 

Or was it knob? Which was the better insult? 

Rubbing wearily at her face, Shianni swung her legs over the edge of the bed, wincing at the cold that crept up her legs beneath her night gown. “Where are you from, again?” she asked, waiting for her brain to wake up sufficiently so that she could remember the girl’s name. She’d been told yesterday, she knew she had, but between then and now had been a few too many glasses of wine and a bad night’s sleep. 

“Redcliffe, messere. There was good work to be had after the Blight, but when the Lady Guerrin invited the mages to stay in the town, it weren’t so safe anymore.”

Shianni took the robe that the girl held out for her, the name Roanyth drifting groggily back into her thoughts. “The mages were that bad?” she asked, tieing the robe loosely at her waist and wandering over to the small bureau under the window, frowning at the thin layer of ice over the water in the bowl before her. Beyond the window, Gwaren stretched before her, hazy woodsmoke hanging over the rooftops and the trees slowly shaking off the night frost as it melted into slush. Through the branches there were flashes of colour, bright ropes of pennants strung across the streets and painted murals and a multitude of flowers beginning to cautiously awaken now that the sun was up. There were archways of wisteria and cherry blossoms and vines of arbor blessing winding over rooftops and across streets, a canopy of colour in the spring and summer, but in the winter the leaves and the branches worked well to cushion those below from the worst of the storms. 

Gwaren was barely recognisable compared to a decade earlier, when she’d arrived filthy and exhausted and overwhelmed with the daunting task of turning an abandoned human city into a home for her people. 

“It was just...” Shianni glanced over her shoulder at her, to where the girl was fidgeting. “I hate to speak ill of the Arlessa...”

Shianni made a rude noise, the frozen colours of the city forgotten. “Oh Maker, you go right ahead da’len,” she said, flicking at the ice until it cracked and scooping up the freezing water beneath to splash on her face. “No one round here is gonna take offence on behalf of a shem lord.”

“But you’re a _Bann_ , my lady. Don’t you-”

“I’m just an administrator,” Shianni said quickly, cursing under her breath at the shock of cold water on her skin. Gritting her teeth, she scrubbed ferociously at her face and neck. “The title itself just means that people are less likely to call me knife-ear to my face.”

She could feel her hesitation behind her like a physical thing, and she began to suspect Roanyth didn’t yet have the pluck to speak up about what had happened in Redcliffe- because something _always_ happened, an inevitability even in the kindest of shem households, because no lord’s reach was so long that he could put a stop to the leers that came from the guards on the night watch, or the insults that were offered as humorous nicknames, or the feet put in the way to trip them for amusement. But then she took a deep breath and the words tumbled out of her in a rush. “It weren’t just the mages, my lady,” she said quickly, almost babbling. “It was so crowded, and there weren’t enough food, and da got beat by some shem mages when he were walking back from town- we don’t know if it were the refugees or the townsfolk, he says he don’t remember and it was dark, but it had to be mages. And then, it weren’t just the mages and the refugees, you know? There were templars up in the hills, and sometimes at night, you could see the fires, and sometimes they came into town, but they weren’t in armour and they pretended like they weren’t templars, but we all knew. And they-”

Shianni glanced over her shoulder, pushing her hair back from her face and flicking the wet strands away from her eyes. Roanyth’s face was scrunched up angrily, like she was fighting back tears, and she was biting her lip fiercely. 

Her heart broke, because she knew that look. She’d lived that look, the anger and the frustration and the fear of every young woman condemned to a life of poverty and mockery just as a consequence of her birth and the misfortune of her race.

“It’s okay,” she said, crossing back to where Roanyth stood and putting a hand on her shoulder. Her lip wobbled treacherously and Shianni took her hand in hers. “You’re safe now. Gwaren might not be much better than a frozen shithole most days, but it’s _our_ frozen shithole, and you’re safe here.”

And what a marvel it was to be able to say that at all. 

A decade ago, she’d met the fabled Hero of Ferelden, a woman who probably wouldn’t have looked twice at her prior to losing her family and home and being forcibly recruited into the Grey Wardens. She’d heard the stories about the Highever alienage, and the desperation the people there lived with every single day, and she couldn’t say she felt any remorse for the fall of the Cousland family. She felt bad for _her_ , sure, because no one deserved to lose their family and their life so horrifically, but there was a small part of her that felt a heartless sort of glee seeing someone as powerful as the Lady Cousland forced to play fetch for other nobles who seemed determined to turn a blind eye to her fall from grace. 

Shem lords and their power games didn’t interest her at all, and she sure as shit didn’t give a rats ass about them normally, but the Lady had been the only one even vaguely interested in the fact that everyone she knew and loved (and okay, some of them she tolerated to their face but made rude gestures behind their back) was being slowly preyed upon by Tevinter slavers. 

She wasn’t dumb- she knew the Lady Cousland didn’t give much of a shit about them, and was there as a means of trying to outwit Teyrn Mac Tir in the civil war, as badly as that had turned out for both of them. But she’d come back when the darkspawn overran them, and she hadn’t expected that. Shems didn’t run in to risk their lives for elves, that was a fact of life, and certainly not when the fate of the world hung in the balance. But she’d come running, her and the Teyrn, and they’d faced down a seething tide of evil that would have crushed them, still locked in the mud and the shit of the alienage even when their human watchers had fled. 

And Elissa had talked to her, really _talked_ to her, and she was a bit of an asshole but at least she was honest about it. Shianni had clasped her hand and ignored the gore on her face and thanked her with everything in her, and Elissa had smashed apart the mechanism on the portcullis so it couldn’t be closed on them, urging them to hide or to risk the sprint through the city to the gates held by the army. 

She’d assumed that was the last she’d ever see of her- even if they both survived the siege, fancy noble Lady wardens didn’t slum about with elves, unless it was to yell at one for overcooking the roast during some fancy dinner party. Everyone heard about the spat between her and the new king, of course, and Queen Anora only seemed to make it worse by siding with the Lady Cousland. When Elissa was declared the new Teyrna of Gwaren, some sort of recompense from the crown for the crimes committed against the Cousland family, word was out of the palace that it was some sort of petty little power play by King Alistair. Admittedly, with Loghain sworn into the wardens, he couldn’t technically hold a title, but then neither could Lady Cousland, and anyone who’d spent five minutes talking to Elissa knew that there was nothing she wanted less than to be foisted with more responsibility.

Giving away his wife’s family holdings to the one woman in the country who did not want them was supposed to look, at a quick glance, like a generous offer from the King, his first act of government a decisive and firm handed one. Anyone who looked closer- and Shianni scrunched up her nose and squinted disdainfully when she heard the news- knew it for what it was, a cheap and underhanded ploy to unsettle the queen, further discredit Loghain and hurt Elissa. 

Shianni felt vaguely bad for her, in the awkward sort of way you could feel sorry for a noblewoman being handed more riches at the wave of a hand, but she’d assumed that was the last of it. Back to the alienage for her, back to scraping out a living with even less food thanks to the Blight, back to hoping that the winter storms wouldn’t be too harsh given that half the buildings had lost their walls and their roofs from fires and violence. 

Except that one morning when she’d woken up, head aching from another night spent with a badly brewed swill she’d charmed away from Alarith, to find Elissa Cousland slumped down against the wall next to her bed, cradling the empty bottle from the night before as if it were an infant, eyes bloodshot and broken in a way that still haunted her all these years later. 

“Can you read?” she’d asked without preamble, her voice rough from lack of sleep. 

Blinking in confusion, it had taken her a moment to accept the fact that there was most definitely an aggressively unpredictable war hero lying next to her bed. “Don’t shems know anything about fucking knocking?” she’d grumbled instead, bewildered and unsettled to find her watching her while she slept.

“Didn’t want to wake you,” she’d said, and there was a slight slur to her words. “Can you read? Don’t think any of the elves back home could.”

“Of course, because all elves everywhere are just a vague amorphous mass, all sharing skills and faces and utterly indistinguishable from one another.”

Elissa had pointed the empty bottle at her. “You’ve got a smart mouth,” she’d said. “I like you.”

Struggling to sit up, wincing at the ache in her head, she’d said “What do you want?”

“Can you _read_?” she’d said for the third time in a slow, insulting tone, and Shianni had been tempted to throw her out on her ear, doglord or no. “Or write. Or count. Useful things.”

“Because Maker help me, what good would I possibly be if I wasn’t _useful_ ,” she’d muttered. When Elissa had fixed her with a glare, she’d thrown her hands in the air in frustration. “ _Yes_ , Andraste’s saggy tits, I can _read_.” Not well, of course, but it wasn’t like they had access to the haughty private libraries the shems liked to keep. 

Something like relief had passed through Elissa’s eyes. “Great,” she’d said. “How do you feel about having Gwaren?”

Ten years later and it still made her shiver, the immense ramifications of such an offer still making ripples across the political and social landscape of Thedas. Because with that casual offer, Elissa Cousland had caused the greatest political scandal in recent history, declaring publicly that Gwaren and the surrounding parts of the Brecilian contained within the borders of the teyrnir were now solely the domain of the elves who had fought and shed blood and died during the Blight. She gave a grand and noble speech about it to the Landsmeet, an affair to which Shianni had been rather forcefully announced as the future administrator of the territory, and during which Elissa also appointed her the title of Bann.

She still had no idea if Elissa was allowed to grant that sort of title- she suspected not. 

More importantly, however, that was the first time she’d met Lanaya. 

Back in the present, the young girl before her- Roanyth- ducked her head to hide the tears, dashing them away with the back of her hand and clearing her throat quietly. “I’m sorry, my Lady,” she said. “You ain’t paying me to whine.”

Shianni winked at her when she looked back up again. “Speaking of wine,” she said, “find out what it was I had with dinner last night, and make sure they don’t let me have it again. I haven’t had a headache this bad in a long time.”

“O-of course, my Lady.”

“Shianni is fine, really.” She made a shooing gesture. “And I’m awake now, you don’t have to hover. I can dress myself just fine.”

Roanyth’s footsteps vanished down the hallway as she stepped behind the wooden screen in the corner, smiling briefly at the careful carvings in the panels that depicted scenes from elven myth. With the weather clear today- or as clear as it was going to get this time of year- she knew she had to take advantage of the opportunity to spend some time outdoors. 

The thought made her shudder, and she shucked her robe up and over her head, hanging it over the top of the screen before she could change her mind and crawl back into bed. 

She was no lord, regardless of the title Elissa had foisted on her, and she had never once in the last ten years locked herself away in a fancy manor or made herself unavailable to the people she served. She was an elf, and she’d damn well live like one. 

She didn’t live in the keep on top of the hill, the old residence of the Mac Tirs, and Voric’s line before them; not long after settling in the Blight abandoned city, they’d established the keep as their community lodging, the place where the elderly and the infirm and the orphans could find shelter and food, and the place where those amongst the Dalish could choose to find a bed with ease when they passed through the area and did not want to spend a night in the open. The land around Gwaren could get fiercely cold in the winter, and the storms sweeping in off the Amaranthine Ocean were terrifying even when they were mild, screaming through the narrow corridor of land known as the Brecilian Passage with enough force to strip the leaves from the trees.

Winter in the south was an experience, to be sure. 

Most of the Dalish across Ferelden who’d cautiously taken up Elissa’s offer of sanctuary via Keeper Lanaya preferred to keep to their own ways, and there was a permanent encampment in the forest not a league away from the city proper. With each passing year, the two cultures entwined a little more, old prejudices slowly fading as caution gave way to optimism; there were now Dalish who lived in the township year round, and alienage elves who’d tentatively decided to try their luck with the nomadic lifestyle of their cousins. 

There were still clans who, although they’d migrated to the territory protected by Gwaren’s name, had preferred to remain separate, and she couldn’t really blame them for that. Not everyone was happy to kiss and make-up after centuries of animosity between cultures; for those that did attempt to integrate, encouraged by Lanaya’s leadership, they followed the migration of the halla through the southlands and the Brecilian, their path bringing them back to Gwaren two or three times a year, depending on the mood of the herds. 

Those brief few months, when Lanaya came back to her, were everything. 

Funny how that worked out- a woman out of legends, a Keeper of the Dalish nonetheless, born of magic and myth and walking in the footsteps of ancient gods... in love with a no good, broken bit of shem scrap who couldn’t keep her mouth shut even to save her life. 

Shianni shook her shoulders, hoping to shake off the morbid melancholy that had slunk into her veins too, and set to work getting ready for the day. From somewhere downstairs she could smell what she hoped was fried eggs and toast, and the promise of a hot breakfast was all the motivation she needed to strip off her underthings- admittedly cursing ferociously from the cold as she did so- and change into something sturdy enough to withstand the icy puddles and mud out in the clay streets. 

She stopped before the vanity to pin back her hair, pausing for a moment to take in her reflection. There were more white strands through the red than she’d like to admit to, and she didn’t know whether to admit that she looked older than her years, or whether to be kind and accept the fact that elven women weren’t generally given the chance to take care of their skin and appearance, not when life in an alienage was so often hand to mouth living. 

At some point she’d stopped worrying about keeping her hair short- survival instinct, honed over years of terrifying encounters with human guards who laughed as they dragged elf girls about by their braids, with human nobles who saw the hunt as half the fun when they snagged an elf woman by the hair when they tried to escape. Even short hair couldn’t spare you, sometimes, and her skin prickled as old memories tried to bubble up; she shivered and ran her hands down her arms, trying to settle the ache within her before it opened up old wounds. 

For a time, eleven odd years ago or so, she’d nearly shaved her hair off. She’d taken to it with scissors, hacking it off in chunks, and it was only Uncle Cyrion’s quiet interruption and steady hands that had stopped her before she’d made a complete mess of it, prising the shears from her white knuckled hands and gently setting them aside, brushing the loose locks of hair off of her clothes before enveloping her in a hug, murmuring quietly to her as she’d sobbed and screamed. 

It had grown back patchy, a good few months passing before it was long enough to even it out again, and longer still for the whispers to stop as she passed. Trouble maker, rabble rouser, mouthy bitch, shem whore. She’d kept her head high and ignored them all, and she’d fought for all their dumb asses when their far-too-convenient Tevinter _saviours_ had come sweeping in to cure them all of their mysteriously unexplained plague. 

Now... now it was long enough to reach the middle of her back, and it felt surprisingly girlish having long hair. 

Lanaya had made a joke once about wanting to braid flowers through it, and that had been enough for her to quietly set the scissors aside for good. There weren’t any shem soldiers now, no doglords with blunt, monstrous fingers that pinched and bruised. For once she could make that choice for herself, and that choice was to shake off the fears of an older life and try to embrace the love and freedom that had grown in its stead. 

“Oh, look at you,” she grouched, turning away from the mirror and sitting down on the edge of the bed to pull on her boots. “She hasn’t even been gone three months and you’re stupid maudlin over her.”

She stopped by her office on her way to the dining room, scooping up an armful of folios and loose reports from the mess on the desk. Maker fucking take Elissa Cousland for assuming that just because a girl knew how to read badly meant that she was in any way fit to be the administrator for an entire fucking teyrnir. What in the Void did she know about accounts, or civics? Luckily there’d been a few elves who had made their way to Gwaren who had worked as scribes and bookkeepers for their thankless human masters, and amongst them they’d shakily fumbled their way towards understanding the complexities of land management. 

She would never not be grateful for the immensity of such a gift, but... _ugh_ , sometimes shems didn’t have a lick of common sense. 

Breakfast was a rushed affair, toast balanced precariously in one hand while she flipped through repair expenditures from the last winter storm that had swept through earlier in the week. Bundling herself into a coat and wrapping a lengthy scarf around her neck, she wedged the last slice of marmalade and toast into her mouth while she tried to carry the folders she’d need for her inspections around town. 

The cold was like a slap in the face the moment she stepped out the front door, the puddles across the street piled up around the edges with insolent slush that wasn’t quite ice and wasn’t quite snow but was most assuredly evil. Even as she pulled her coat tighter around herself, the trellis arching above the street loosed another layer of melting frost, splattering down in any icy rain on any unsuspecting passersby.

“Don’t you fucking dare,” she muttered, casting a dark glare at the branches above her and clutching her files closer to her chest. She pulled her scarf up over her nose, the cold already burning when she breathed in. “I’ll have you all burned to a cinder if you even think about it.”

And then... to work. 

Down by the waterfront, there was a crew working to repair a pier in the choppy water, a merchant boat having pulled free of her moorings and smashed against it in the night. She watched for a time, gritting her teeth against each gust that brought a fine mist of sea spray towards her, chatting with the foreman about the extent of the damage and the cost of the repairs and the necessary resources. 

She made the necessary notes, signed the papers needed, and moved on. 

The keep was a bustle of activity, even this early, and she was caught in a dozen different conversations as she tried to make her way across the courtyard to the great hall. A caravan of refugees was less than a day out, more from Redcliffe and West Hills and Jainen; word was there were Orlesian elves risking the border as well, fleeing the ongoing civil war and the massacres that verged on outright genocide. Food stores were strained at the moment, having lost near to all the contents of a grain silo to the giant rats that crept up from the Wilds. She soothed tempers, handed in signed reports to the scribes who worked diligently to make her scribbles legible, offered reassurances that she was sure sounded hollow. 

There were two new babies in the wing that served as their hospital, two bright new souls born into freedom and safety amongst their own people, and Shianni’s heart fluttered joyously as she met both, smiling wonderously at their wrinkled faces and flattened ears that would settle into a more defined shape over the coming days. 

There was an influx of mages, mostly teenagers and young adults who had fled while senior mages bought them time with their lives. Kinloch Hold had been one of the last Circles to fall, true, but Jainen was further north and she couldn’t even begin to imagine how hard it must have been for frightened children to try to convince a captain to allow them passage to the mainland. They’d converted an old manor into a communal home for the mages a few years back, something that had belonged to a shem merchant with more money than sense, but it had become full nearly a month ago. Now the young mages huddled together in the great hall, clinging close to the fire and eyeing them all nervously as she moved amongst them and asked after their names and their stories. 

It was nearly noon by the time she managed to free herself from the crowded halls and head back out into the weak winter sunshine. The streets were busier now and she made her way to the market, calling out greetings to familiar faces as she walked. 

People called her Hahren- she still couldn’t believe she’d survived long enough to be honoured as one of the elders. 

She was only just over thirty. She didn’t want the children growing up under her watchful eye to have a life expectancy half of what they were owed. Their people had, according to myth, walked the world as immortals once; hahren should have been a title given to one who had seen more than thirty summers. 

Never again- not in her city. They might not be immortal like the stories, but as long as the Maker saw fit to let them live in peace by themselves, she’d see to it that her kin had a chance to live.

The streets opened up to the sky, the buildings falling back to reveal a grassy green plaza that served as their market and their fairground and their amphitheatre. In fact it had once been the market square for the people of Gwaren, but like most other things in the city, the elves had elected to remake it to better suit themselves. The cobblestones had been ripped up, and grass grown in its place, and not the immaculate trimmed lawns that one was likely to see on the front step of a shem manor. It was lumpy and overgrown, crushed down to mud in places of high traffic, and there were tiny flowers scattering bursts of colour throughout it all. 

The vhenadahl stood vast and proud in the centre of the square, its growth far too extensive for a normal ten year old sapling, but the Dalish had magics that had encouraged and nurtured the seed right from the very day of its planting; it had been the first of many acts of shared culture, the alienage elves eager to explain the significance of the tree to their cousins, and the Dalish taking in the joy and solemnity of the tradition with respect and curiosity. 

It was the first time they had held a celebration in Gwaren, with the planting and enchantment of the vhenadahl, and Shianni had been entranced watching Lanaya weave her magic for the crowd, well aware that there was a touch of flamboyance in the display that was purely to entertain the younglings in the crowd, but... still. 

Lanaya and a handful of Keepers from other clans had performed the ritual, and Shianni had only had eyes for Lanaya. She moved like water, dancing with the ebb and flow of the magic as it sparked and crackled in the air above them like fireworks. Her skin had glistened like gold beneath the light of the fires, and colours had flown from her fingers like she was an artist painting onto the world itself. All silly flamboyance, she knew now, but at the time it had stolen the breath right out of her lungs. 

She’d kissed her that night, for the first time, half drunk on excitement and the giddy sensation that freedom brought with it. The market had been strung with lanterns and the air had been thick with smoke from numerous bonfires, and there’d been ale and feasting and dancing and magic in the air and she’d kissed Lanaya beneath the branches of the tiny sapling. 

She quite liked the vhenadahl. 

The tree had lost a large branch in the storm, the market itself looking rather ragged in general- a good number of merchants were still to open for the day, the booths locked tight against the chill, and there was a good deal of leaf debris scattered across the grass. There were a few large puddles that she eyed suspiciously, giving them a wide berth lest she find herself waist deep in a icy water. The bunting that was strung between the rooftops had been torn astray, hanging forlornly down into the puddles, and a work crew was currently trying to remove the massive branch from where it had fallen across the roof of the tailor. 

“Maker’s Breath,” she muttered, steeling herself as she headed over towards the work crew. There were six of them in total, scampering over the broken roof tiles as they carefully navigated their way around the broken branch that was thicker across than any of their waists. There was another on the ground, supervising with a frown on her face, and Shianni made her way to her.

“Fuck’s sake, Naenarion, is it going to bite you?” she shouted, and Shianni winced at the censure, biting her tongue. The supervisor gestured pointedly and one of the elves up on the roof rolled his eyes. “Don’t give me that look, you little shit, your ma said I could drag you by the ear if need be.”

“Ma ain’t here, Derri, but this branch is and it’d be such a bleedin’ shame if it came down on top of you-”

“Oh, quit your grandstanding, you think I haven’t raised three boys of my own? Just get back to work.”

“Everything’s going well, then,” Shianni said with a wry smile, judging the moment to be a little safer to interrupt.

The woman supervising made a rude noise and crossed her arms. “Oh aye, if six daft boys and a whole morning wasted can be counted as _well_ ,” she said. “You’d think the damn branch was blighted, for all that they don’t want to go near it.”

“Any water damage in the shop?”

“They’ve lost about six bolts, Sinarelle would be able to give you a better idea of what the cloth cost, but most of the damage is just structural. Mostly tiles, but one of the roof beams looks like it might have taken a hit, it groaned pretty bad when one of the boys climbed up on it.”

Shianni scribbled some notes on the top of a blank page, the charcoal brittle in her fingers. “Can you get it repaired?”

“If the weather holds, sure. The beam might need a brace, so I’ll send one of the boys down to the lumberyard.” She held out her hand expectantly, and Shianni jotted down a promissory note for the expenses. “Much obliged, Hahren.” 

There was a cry from across the marketplace, delighted shouts, and Shianni looked up in time to see people pointing towards the east gate. Nodding a goodbye to Derri, Shianni hurried across the square, weaving in and out of the crowds, most of whom seemed as curious as she was to learn the source of the disturbance. A gangly young man ran past in the rough uniform of the watch, and she grabbed at his wrist to get his attention.

He jerked around in surprise almost comically, the panic in his eyes settling only marginally when he saw who had hold of him. “Hahren Shianni,” he stammered, leaning back as far as he could while she still had a vice grip on his wrist, and she wasn’t sure whether he was overcome by nerves or excitement.

“What’s going on?”

The panic in his eyes flared again. “I was on my way to the keep now, milady, I promise, I was heading-”

“I’m right _here_ ,” she said pointedly, squeezing his wrist for emphasis. “Just _tell_ me.”

“The halla have been sighted, my Lady,” he said quickly, red to the tips of his ears. “The herds have returned early!”

Shianni let go of him so quickly it was if he’d burnt her hand. “That can’t be right,” she said, a bubble of fear rising in her throat. “The halla won’t be due to migrate for another two months, are you sure-”

“I saw it with me own eyes, milady,” he said, gesturing down the thoroughfare towards the east gate. “They were coming down over the hill, from the west, and the clans were with ‘em!”

She swallowed down the panic, confused as to why she’d even jumped to fear as her first response. “Continue up to the keep,” she said, stepping aside to let him pass her in the crowd. “Someone has to let them know to get the... everything, ready.”

He made a rough salute in her direction and then scampered, disappearing into the crowd and up the hill towards the keep. Shianni gritted her teeth and turned back towards the gate, the crowds growing thicker now as news began to filter through about what was causing the excitement. The arrival of the halla was a grand event, where the families of the town would line the walls of the city to watch as the aravels- the great landships- came gliding across the landscape, sails bright and colourful and pennants snapping in the breeze, the pure white halla honking and braying as they followed the gentle prompting of the herdmasters. It was a sight to behold, and was usually followed by grand feasting and joyous celebrations, for families were reunited and friends had a chance to catch up, and lovers found one another again in the chaos. 

But for the halla to be here so early, when there was nothing but news of war and violence brewing in the world beyond their borders... 

She could see the gate at the end of the boulevard when the cry went up from ahead, and from through the open portal she could see it- the vivid red sails, the gold and green banners carefully embroidered with old magic, and the flash of the sun as it reflected off of fine armour. 

The Dalish really _had_ retreated to Gwaren.

Shianni’s stomach lurched up into her throat, and she fought back the panic seething through her veins. She stopped apologising for those she pushed roughly past, not even stopping to glance back to throw them a contrite look. There were faces now, the sharp lines of the vallaslin a splash of colour in the crowd, some that she recognised and some that she did not- all wore the travelling armour of the Dalish, all greens and browns and greys to help them blend with the dappled colours of the forest, all intricate and alien and achingly familiar to her now.

But not the faces she was looking for. Not the particular one. She kept pushing forward, almost to the gate, and then-

And then there she was, resplendent atop a russet coloured hart with velvet horns as wide across as the beast was long. Lanaya, High Keeper of the Clans, voice of Ferelden’s Dalish people. Her armoured robes glittered in the weak winter sunlight, the most exquisite work their smiths had ever crafted, and across her back she had her stave strapped within easy reach, the crystals sparkling when they caught the light; she looked like some sort of damn warrior princess from the tales, ready to march across the Dales in defiance and pride. Her hair was sun bleached and her skin was bronzed from her time outdoors, but her markings were still bright and striking against her cheeks. _June_ , she knew, after all these years together, the god of craftsmanship and creation, and even if she felt no call towards the elvish deities herself, she could still appreciate the opportunity for a light hearted joke. 

Lanaya was marked as a devotee of the Crafter, and she’d worked to painstakingly help her put her heart back together from the thousands of ragged shards that it had broken down into. She’d done her god proud in rebuilding her trust from nothing. 

The crowds parted as the massive creature let out a lowing call, a rumbling sound that startled more than a few of the children in the street into shrieking giggles. Lanaya was waving in greeting, open and welcoming in her smile, one hand rubbing soothingly at the hart’s neck while she waved to the crowd. She’d always been better at this, better at playing the part of noble leader inspiring awe and confidence in the people, and Shianni felt positively bland beside her, in her chunky boots and her tangled scarf and her windblown hair. 

She was the most beautiful woman she’d ever seen, and the faint moment of concern faded in the face of her overwhelming relief.

Lanaya met her eyes across the crowd, and she felt her heart skip a beat. 

“Aneth ara, Hahren Shianni,” Lanaya called, urging the hart carefully forward. “I hope you have food and warm lodging for some water-logged hunters.”

Despite the fear, she laughed, the grin coming a little easier to her for hearing her voice. “I’m sure we can manage something,” she called back, watching as Lanaya swung her leg gracefully over the side of her mount and slid to the ground. 

Her stomach fluttered like it was full of moths.

“We weren’t expecting you back for another few weeks,” she said, not smiling so much as beaming like a giddy young girl facing her first crush. “You must have ridden hard to keep ahead of the news.”

“Maybe we were just too eager to be back amongst our kin,” Lanaya said, handing off the reins to someone who had dashed forward eagerly. When she slid her arm around Shianni’s waist and leaned in to kiss her, there was an eager round of cheering from the crowd around them; Shianni laughed, mildly embarrassed, but then Lanaya’s mouth was against hers and that seemed far more important than the hooting and clapping of the townsfolk. She slid her hands up around her neck, leaning into the curve of her as Lanaya’s hands slid down her back; Lanaya took advantage of her height to dip Shianni backwards slightly, to the utter delight of the crowd, and when she righted her again both of them broke apart with laughter and red faces. 

Shianni brought her giggles under control, somewhat awkwardly clearing her throat. “I’d love to think myself so irresistible, but I know you wouldn’t hurry the halla back to the eastern pastures without good reason.” She leaned back, hands resting lightly on Lanaya’s shoulders as she looked up at her. “What’s going on, love?” 

Lanaya hesitated, the laughter lines along the edge of her eyes suddenly looking more like worry lines. “Ir abelas, Shianni, but we need to call together the elders,” she said evasively, her voice dropping lower so that no one in the crowd around them could overhear her. “We’ve got a situation.”

“A situation is a fairly broad descriptor, love-”

“Shianni, we cannot talk of this in the open,” she said sharply, her fingers tightening around her waist, as if as a warning. “Call the hahren- I have already sent word for any Keepers in the settlement to join us in town.”

“Lanaya,” she said, running her fingers along her cheek. “Emma lath?”

Lanaya closed her eyes, a hint of something like grief in her expression before she hid it. “The war has come to us, ma vhenan,” she said. “There is a templar army behind us.”


	2. 9:41 Dragon, Gwaren

_“Until such a time as Gwaren is deemed sufficiently safe from the touch of the Blight, it is my great sorrow to declare that the teyrnir is considered unfit for human habitation. No human may return to the city of Gwaren or the surrounding lands and territories until I, Elissa Margarethe Cousland, deem it acceptable. For now, I invite any patriotic elves across Ferelden to join me in restoring the teyrnir to its former glory.”_

_The Landsmeet, Denerim, 9:30 Dragon_

***

Lanaya sat by the window and stared out into the pre dawn murk, watching the horizon and the faint smear of colour across the ocean that signalled the coming of the day. In the bed behind her, Shianni snored quietly, sprawled on her stomach with her hair a red splash across the sheets; Lanaya smiled, tucking her feet up beside her as she watched her sleep. She was probably most politely described as an enthusiastic sleeper, fond of late mornings and lounging about, and Lanaya wasn’t one to dissuade her from it. There had been too many nights in the early days of their courtship when Shianni’s night terrors had left them both stressed and exhausted, and though they came with far less frequency now than they had ten years ago, she was still not going to rob her of a good night’s sleep. 

She deserved the peace that sleep brought her. 

How odd it was, to be in love. She had not ever thought to find herself in this position- well, maybe once upon a time, as a small girl watching the love her parents had for one another, but later? After having watched them be cut down so brutally by shem bandits and being taken in by the Dalish, only slowly offered camaraderie and respect and trust over the long years? Love was definitely not something she had imagined for herself.

Perhaps, as well, there was something to be said about the way in which Zathrian had conducted himself as a leader and a mentor. He was closed off, a man of quiet praise and little warmth, and in her desperate yearning for his approval she had modelled so much of herself off of him. To be a Keeper was to stand apart, to remember every loss and every moment of grief, and to carry the hopes of the elvhen into the future. 

Permanency was something she had not ever expected to find in her life, not like this. The nomadic lifestyle of the Dalish was a necessity, born out of centuries of shem violence against fixed settlements, and the idea of a permanent location to affix the title of _home_ to was still amusing and occasionally anxiety inducing. Home had always been people, the proud and careful way of life amongst kin and clan, and home became whatever clan one walked with, regardless of whether they were blood family or not. 

She had never thought she would find herself sitting awake at night in the forest, watching the stillness of the camp as the rain pattered down soft and constant against the leaves, leaking through the canopy overhead to drum against the roofs of the aravels, and wondering whether someone far away from her was thinking of her. 

It felt far too whimsical and melodramatic for her tastes, but she couldn’t help but smile about it each time she caught herself pining for Shianni, and the comfort of their bed together in Gwaren. 

Watching her sleep, she knew even now that the permanency she felt in her heart was in no way affixed to Gwaren, though she was coming to love the township and the way it was slowly coming to reflect the hearts and souls of both cultures. Rather, the longing she felt to return had everything to do with the woman sleeping noisily in the bed behind her, a woman of sharp edges and quiet tears and whose heart was the truest and most passionate she had ever encountered. 

In the distance, there was a faint rumble of thunder, barely loud enough to register; if she hadn’t been watching the horizon, she probably would have missed the telltale flicker of light, the barest flare against the murk, and wouldn’t have known to listen for the rolling echoes of the thunder. 

Perhaps it was overdramatic, but it seemed a fitting metaphor for their current situation- there was a storm brewing on their borders, the echoes of war only barely rippling through their lands, but if you knew where to look and knew to stay vigilant...

Behind her, Shianni snorted loudly once and rolled over, taking most of the blankets with her in a tangled cocoon. Lanaya smiled to herself, laughing quietly at the thought that her sense of melodrama was so bad that Shianni had sensed it even in sleep, scolding her while she continued to snore. 

She leaned back against the window, the deep cold of the glass a quiet comfort to her. 

Eleven years ago, a rude and desperate shem woman had come staggering into their forest camp, escorted by their scouts and almost proudly sporting a bloodied nose where she’d tussled with one of them. Lanaya had never expected that Zathrian would listen to her absurd demands, least of all consider _agreeing_ to them, but she’d learned the hard way that while Elissa Cousland was strangely charismatic despite her rough edges, Zathrian had been working to his own agenda that had nothing to do with Elissa’s arrival.

It hurt, even all these years later, but it hurt a little less for the painfully awkward yet genuine apology that Elissa had offered to her when she’d informed her she was now Keeper. 

From loyal First to bewildered Keeper in a matter of days, and from there to leading the largest alliance of Dalish clans in centuries in battle against the Archdemon. She had walked through lands that had long been forbidden to her people, she had seen the great city of Denerim and the endless rolling hills of the Bannorn. And through it all, despite her acerbic tongue and her brittle moods, Elissa had been a loyal ally in spite of Lanaya’s initial reservations about her. 

It was Elissa who had dragged a waifish, red-haired spitfire into her aravel early one morning while they were camped outside the ruined walls of Denerim and informed her rather bluntly that she was giving them- elves, from the alienages and from the clans- their own land. It was Elissa who had stood before the Landsmeet and defied the King, petty and underhanded in her arguments but effective and cutting nonetheless, insisting that she and the spitfire- Shianni, she’d learned- were to act as her voice, that Gwaren was _certainly_ not being handed over to the elves with no consideration to how such an act would affect the delicate post Blight economy, or how it would reflect on the country across the border. _Definitely not_ , she'd said dismissively, how belittling of them to even _suggest_ she would be so callous as to snatch away homes that had been abandoned for near on a year now by families who had made new lives overseas far away from the danger.

How silly did they think she was, she'd asked boldly, because was she not to have served as de facto ruler of Highever in her father's absence the year before? When Arl Eamon rightly pointed out to the Landsmeet that Lady Cousland had made no secret of her desire to be free of such responsibilities, she'd dramatically burst into tears, wailing about her father's murder and her desire to live up to his memory, and the approval of the court had hastily swung back in her favour.

The moment she'd had control of the room again, the tears had stopped. 

Lanaya had learned a lot watching Elissa dodge and dance in her attempts to manipulate the shemlords; she wasn't subtle, and she didn't frame her plans in gentler language to woo the skeptics to her position. She was just as bullheaded with them as she had been with Zathrian, tiptoeing along the line between outrageous and outright insulting.

By the end of the day, Elissa was still technically Teyrna of Gwaren- but she'd made it abundantly clear that she would not be welcoming any human refugees back to the city. Lanaya didn't know whether she'd done it as a show of genuine solidarity with the elves she was claiming to champion, or whether it was simply a way to cause greater difficulties for the crown.

She suspected it was the latter.

And now it had finally come full circle to bite them, like Fen’harel’s slow arrow finally crashing back down to earth to fell their carefully laid plans. Elissa might have forbidden humans from her lands, but Elissa was not here to confront the crown about the incursion. She drummed her fingers against the sill, her thoughts racing. 

Therinfall Redoubt had never featured heavily in her thoughts prior to these last few weeks; an abandoned shem fortress left to crumble under the relentless passage of the elements was nothing unusual. Ferelden had a long and bloody past, and there were ruins built atop ruins built atop ruins- Alamarri and Tevinter and elvhen, it all reached a point where it blurred together. Therinfall was no different, another ruin to shelter in on the nights when the frost was sharpest, another place to watch for bandits and highwaymen hidden in the crumbling hallways. 

She traced patterns slowly in the frost on the glass, swirling shapes that meant nothing but to calm her miserable thoughts. 

The arguments amongst the elders had lasted long into the night, bickering backwards and forwards about how to deal with this uneasy presence on the edge of their borders. For the elves who had come to Gwaren from the alienages, the stubbornness in their blood that saw them bite back every time the boot on their neck pressed down too hard made it obvious that the answer was confrontation, and violence. Drive them off, hiss and spit and kick and fight, defend the land hard won with blood and sweat. 

The Dalish, on the other hand, were more determined to draw back, to avoid the threats that could easily erase more of their culture, their history, their people. Two of the Keepers who had been present at the meeting had done just that, defiant and stubborn as their city kin as they refused to consider a compromise, heading out into the early evening to gather their clans and vanish into the relative safety of the Wilds to the south. Some of the alienage hahrens spat curses at them as they left, but it was all that had kept the Dalish alive these past few centuries- live to fight another day, retreat to survive, cling to the fringes of the world and let the world pass them by. 

Two clans gone, with a third hinting they would follow in the coming days- and she could not necessarily say she blamed them. 

In the bed, Shianni stirred noisily, and when Lanaya glanced over her shoulder she saw her lift her head from the pillows, blinking blearily as her night eyes kicked in. 

“‘s wrong?” she mumbled, rubbing at her face with the heel of her palm, digging at her eyes to clear them of muck. “Somethin’ wrong?”

Her accent was thicker when she was tired, and Lanaya couldn’t help but smile at the adorable timbre to her voice. “Hamin, ma vhenan,” she said, easing herself up from the windowsill and wandering back over to the bed. Shianni kept struggling to sit up from her mountain of blankets, and Lanaya put a hand on her shoulder and gently eased her back down again, leaning in to press a kiss to her forehead. “You need your sleep, Shianni.”

Shianni made a grumbling noise, eyes closed again, but she was smiling in the gloom. “Which one of us has been sleeping under trees in the rain for the last few months,” she said. 

Lanaya laughed softly, settling herself more comfortably on the edge of the bed. “At least I was sleeping, unlike _someone_ I know.”

“You’ve got no proof,” Shianni grumbled, turning her face into the pillow as if she was readying herself for sleep again.

“You just gave me the proof,” Lanaya said, softer now as she ran her fingers through her hair, the grin slowly sliding from her face as she watched her at rest, gently running her hand over her forehead to smooth her hair back before cupping her cheek.

Shianni made a soft sound that could have passed as a chuckle. “I’m not really gonna go to sleep with you doing that, now, am I?”

“I am just... appreciating you, ma vhenan.”

“Oh, is that what the Dalish call it?”

She was laughing at her own wit when Lanaya leaned in and kissed her, her lips still curved into the shape of a smile as Lanaya covered them with her own. She was soft beneath her, her body warm and welcoming and familiar, and even though she’d not meant for the kiss to be anything more than a kiss, it was hard to pull herself away when Shianni kissed her so eagerly in return, her fingers sliding up into her hair as she shifted across the pillow to make room for her in the bed. 

She had her knees either side of her hips when she managed to reel in her senses, breaking away from the kiss for a brief moment. “We can stop whenever you want to,” she murmured, pressing kisses down the line of Shianni’s jaw. 

“I’ll keep that in mind, ma vhenan,” Shianni said breathlessly, shivering when Lanaya kissed the spot below her ear. 

Hearing the elvhen phrase, Lanaya couldn’t help but grin into the darkness. “Lethallan, I thought you said you felt like an imposter using the tongue of the people.”

“I never have a problem using _your_ tongue,” she quipped, a soft moan escaping her when Lanaya nibbled gently at the curved tips of her ears. “Maker’s Breath-”

“That is not your Maker’s Breath you feel, emma lath,” she said, sliding a hand down to Shianni’s hips to grip at her night robe, tugging it slowly upwards. “It is not his name you should be calling.”

Shianni whimpered, shifting to help her pull the robe up over her head. “Maybe I just wanted to practice a little,” she said, her breath hitching for a moment as Lanaya traced her fingers over her bare skin. “I thought- I thought I could practice-” 

“Ma nuvenin,” she whispered, kissing her deeply and cutting her off. “You can practice with me.”

When she slid a bare thigh between Shianni’s leg and pressed it against her, they moaned in unison. “M-ma serranis,” Shianni stuttered, and Lanaya whispered “ _Sehr-ahn-ahs_ ,” in response, gently correcting her pronunciation as she kissed at her neck. She sat back only long enough to tug her own nightshirt up and over her head, letting out a shivery laugh when Shianni ran her hands up her thighs to her hips; the laugh became a breathless groan when Shianni sat up and pressed her mouth to her stomach, open mouthed kisses that burned her skin. 

“You get ahead of yourself, ma vhenan,” she gasped, tossing her clothing into the corner and leaning back down until Shianni had no option but to let herself be pressed back against the pillows. Lanaya kissed her once, _fiercely_ , moaning against her mouth at the feel of bare skin against skin, and then let her lips trail down the curve of her neck, biting softly at the edge of her collarbone.

Shianni’s whimper sent a rush of heat through her, and she retaliated by biting a little harder. Her hands were flat against her shoulder blades, clinging desperately, she soothed each nip against her skin with her tongue, delighting in the way she shuddered and shivered beneath her.

When she kissed lower, her lips moving over the slight swell of her breasts, she chuckled when she felt her breathing quicken in anticipation. She held herself above her, eyes a silver glow in the darkness, smiling wickedly when she saw the same glow in Shianni’s eyes and knowing she was watching her, spellbound. Leaning over her breast, she breathed softly on her nipple, a touch of magic woven through to add the gentle sting of frost. 

The drawn out moan was cut short when she replaced the cold air with the heat of her mouth, her tongue swirling over the pebbled nipple as she suckled gently; Shianni bucked her against her, a strangled shriek on her lips as the movement thrust her breast firmly into Lanaya’s mouth. 

“ _Naya_ ,” she whimpered, her hands clutching hard at her shoulders. 

Lanaya pulled back for a moment, letting out a puff of cold air against her wet nipple. “You can tell me to stop any time you need, emma lath,” she said, nuzzling at the shallow dip between her breasts. “You have control.”

“Don’t ever stop,” Shianni panted, trembling underneath her as she entwined her legs with hers and ground her hips against her. “ _Ever_.”

Chuckling, Lanaya said “Ever? That’s a rather long time- aren’t you worried about bed sores?”

“I appreciate your chivalry, love, but right now it’s interfering with me getting your head between my legs, and that makes me appreciate it less.”

She sucked hard on the currently unattended nipple, enough to make Shianni’s protest trail off on a shuddering squeak; she laughed softly, running her tongue over the bumpy flesh. “If there was something you wanted, why didn’t you just ask?”

Shianni was breathing hard, one hand fisted in Lanaya’s hair as she rubbed one foot along the back of her leg. “You’re a wretched tease,” she said.

“That doesn’t sound like a request to me,” Lanaya said, pointedly going back to pressing kisses to the faint curve of her breasts.

“ _Ar tu na’din_ ,” she snarled instead, the threat so unexpected that Lanaya burst out laughing. 

“Are you going to kill me with kindness?” she asked, still laughing as she let her lips drift lower, ignoring the foot that was trying to dig into the back of her thighs. “Kill me with kisses?”

“It will be slow and it will be painful.”

“Is that so?” Lanaya kissed the firm line of her hipbone, letting one hand slide up underneath her thigh, her thumb brushing dangerously close to the curve of her labia. “Should I inform the clans that they’ll need to elect a new High Keeper?”

Shianni let out an angry sob, squirming beneath her like her skin was aflame. “Maker’s Breath-”

Lanaya moved abruptly, one hand pushing her thighs apart while the other stayed beneath her ass, lifting her bucking hips up to her mouth as she ran her tongue quickly along her cleft. “Do not say his name here,” she growled, the taste of her sending a fierce spark of heat straight to her clit. “Here you say my name, or none at all.”

Shianni was all but sobbing now, chest heaving and her thigh hooked over Lanaya’s shoulder, fingers twisted so tight into the sheets it was a wonder they didn’t tear. “Lanaya,” she wailed, her head falling back against the pillows. “Lanaya, Lanaya-”

“Ma’arlath,” she murmured, and then covered her clit with her mouth, tongue swirling over the little nub as she sucked gently. 

After so many years together, she knew precisely how to bring her to release within half a minute, and how to make the pleasure drag out until she was trembling and exhausted and begging for release. She wasn’t sure what tonight was, but she could feel herself drowning in the silken taste of the wetness against her tongue, in the shallow panting sobs Shianni let out, in the way her foot dug into her back and her hips thrust up against her mouth. She was so beautiful like this, lost in the passion and the pleasure, trusting her to bring her joy and the rush of release. 

When she teased her with her hand too, her fingers sliding easily in the slickness, it only took a few more seconds before Shianni was bucking and wailing, her thighs tightening around her head as she went crashing into bliss. Lanaya scarcely waited for her to come down from the high, wriggling free of her legs and crawling up the bed to her, pulling her into her arms and peppering her face with kisses. 

“I love you,” Shianni panted, clinging to her as if she were adrift in a storm tossed sea. “I love you, I love you.”

Lanaya grinned, running her hands down her back as she nuzzled at the tip of her nose. “You seem rather fond of me, ma vhenan,” she said.

“Fond? Hardly- you’re still a wretched tease.” 

They drifted into blissful silence, racing heart rates slowly settling into something fit for sleep, and Lanaya thought that might be the last of it. She was quite happy for the evening to end there, the taste of her beloved still lingering on her lips, but Shianni was apparently unsettled by something.

She didn’t push her, simply waited for her impatience to get the better of her, pressing quiet kisses to her hairline as Shianni gathered the words that she needed to express herself. 

“Are you going to leave too?” she asked finally, the question laced with self loathing and a hesitance that broke Lanaya’s heart. 

“Ma emma lath,” she murmured, gathering her tighter in her arms. “Ma’arlath, I will never leave you to face something like this alone.”

She felt her tremble. “The other Keepers weren’t all that interested in sticking around,” she said, something small and frightened and desperately lonely in her voice. 

“The other Keepers are prideful creatures, so bound by tradition and so accustomed to pessimism that they cannot envision a world in which we need not run just to survive,” she said. “I can promise you, ma vhenan, that I have no intention of leaving you or _our_ people.”

Shianni was quiet for a time, absorbing that promise and contemplating her next question; Lanaya could feel it coming, could tell that they weren’t done for the evening. So she waited patiently, fingers soothing along her back.

“Why do you suppose the king and queen really let a whole army into Ferelden? Into Gwaren? Do you suppose it’s something to do with Elissa?”

“It’s a retaliation,” she said, the same thing she’d said in the meeting hours earlier. “Arlessa Isolde’s bold alliance with the mages has apparently unsettled too many people in Denerim.”

Shianni shifted, tucking her head under Lanaya’s chin. “I just can’t believe Soris didn’t send word,” she mumbled sleepily, the heartache evident in her voice now that she felt safe enough to speak her fears in the privacy of their room. “I know we haven’t made any friends these last ten years, but surely he has to know what’s going on?”

“Maybe he hasn’t been allowed to send word, emma lath,” Lanaya said quietly, running her fingers through her hair. “Maybe whatever word he sent was intercepted. Maybe he doesn’t even know- if we keep saying maybe, we’ll be here for days trying to guess what is actually the truth.”

Silence unfurled between them, full of every unspoken _maybe_ that could have befallen Soris back in Denerim. When she felt Shianni shiver in her arms, she kissed the top of her head, making wordless soothing noises. 

“I’m frightened, Naya,” Shianni whispered, pressed so tight against her that the words were like kisses against her skin. 

Lanaya closed her eyes, grief swirling within her and snatching away the last lingering joy of the afterglow. “I know, ma vhenan,” she said. “I am too.”

She might almost have fallen asleep like that, clinging tight to one another in the face of an oncoming storm, but Shianni was terrible at sharing space in a bed. After a few minutes she began to fidget, clearly uncomfortable, and Lanaya leaned back onto her elbow, letting her escape. 

“You can always just ask, you know,” she said, watching as Shianni rolled back to the empty side of the bed, sprawling out onto her stomach as if she was trying to see if she could reach from one side of the mattress to the other. 

Shianni’s voice was muffled by the pillow. “I like snuggling with you,” she said, a weak protest all things considered, and she knew it. 

“You also like to be ruler of your own bedroom domain,” she said pointedly, settling back against her side of the bed. “It doesn’t bother me that you don’t want someone touching you while you sleep.”

“Why do you suppose the templars are here, instead of out west at that meeting thing with the Divine?” she asked, moving seamlessly into the next topic just when Lanaya had hoped things were winding down for the night. Outside the window, the sky was vaguely dark grey instead of outright black, a sign that the morning was creeping closer. If they didn’t sleep soon, Shianni would be awful to deal with for the rest of the day. 

Lanaya sighed. “I couldn’t say,” she said wearily, the same thing she’d said repeatedly in the meeting. “We didn’t engage with them at all, only watched from the safety of the forest. But I still don’t think sending a diplomatic envoy is the right approach.”

“But we can’t just ignore them and hope they’ll go away- we need to know what they’re doing here, and how long they’re planning on staying.”

“You know as well as I that we can’t just walk up to the gate and demand an audience with the Knight Vigilant and hope they take us seriously,” Lanaya said. 

“So what? We just ignore them?”

For a moment she wanted to snap angrily at her, but she swallowed back the anger burning at the back of her throat like bile. She wound her fingers through hers slowly, bringing them up to her mouth to press kisses against her knuckles. “My instincts tell me we can’t ignore them,” she said quietly. “It may have been better in the cities, but the relationship between the Dalish and the Templar Order has never been anything but wildly hostile. They hunt us, ma vhenan. They don’t want us for their Circles so much as they want to wipe us out.”

“And so what? We can’t fight them.” Shianni shifted under the blankets, a hint of weary irritation in her voice. “Not when our claim to Gwaren is treated as questionable at best, and if what you saw is true, someone with the royal authority gifted them the right to access Therinfall Redoubt. That far and away outweighs our claim on the area- especially since no one has seen Lady Cousland in nearly eleven years. Without her support, we have nothing."

The frustration in her tone was nothing that Lanaya had not wrestled with herself in the last few weeks. " _We_ are not nothing," she said pointedly. 

"What does that even mean? Are you suggesting that we actually should forcibly expel the Order from our lands? Like, war?"

Lanaya rubbed tiredly at her temple. "I don't know what I'm suggesting," she said. "I know I didn't really... commit to anything in the council session, but the truth is, I don't know what to do."

"What are the templars even doing this far east? If they aren’t at that meeting the Divine is holding in Orlais, or wherever, why aren’t they in Val Royeaux? In the White Spire?"

"I don't _know_ , ma vhenan," she said, fighting back the bubble of fear and irritation growing in her stomach. "Typically when we find ourselves confronted with large groups of armed and armoured humans we do our best _not_ to draw their attention."

Shianni was silent for a long moment, and even in the gloom of the room Lanaya could easily make out the grief and frustration in her eyes. "I'm sorry sweetheart," she said quietly, "I guess you must think me pretty stupid."

Lanaya sighed, closing her eyes. “I don’t think you stupid, emma lath,” she said quietly. “I think you are one of the bravest and most determined women I have ever met, doing an immensely thankless task, and for a good half of the year I leave you to shoulder the weight by yourself. I am intensely proud of you, in all that you do.”

Judging by Shianni’s stunned silence, that hadn’t been the answer she was expecting. “Oh,” she said finally, her voice small. 

“Come, emma lath, let’s get some sleep while we still can. Once word spreads, you know half the town will be hammering down the door the moment the sun is up, wanting reassurances.”

Shianni didn’t respond, and Lanaya finally thought that to be the end of it. She’d begun to drift off, sleep winding through her veins like a drug, when she heard a whispered “Lanaya?”

Groaning, she rolled over onto her side to face her. “Mm?”

“Perhaps... I mean, maybe we should go to that conclave? If the Divine is in charge of the templars, or supposed to be anyway, maybe we could ask her to do something about them?”

“Can we _please_ talk about this in the morning,” Lanaya mumbled, not so much a question as a statement, her face pressed into the pillow. 

“Alright, alright.”

Blessed silence reigned for a whole ten seconds, and then-

“Lanaya?”

She groaned. “By the Dread Wolf, _what_?”

“I missed you.”

Lanaya cracked open an eye, Shianni’s eyes clearly visible in the darkness; the tension bled out of her, and she smiled sadly. “I missed you too.”


End file.
